The Numero Group, primarily known as a record label, is venturing into new media with “Celestial Navigations,” a compilation of the work of Long Island filmmaker Al Jarnow, who’s created everything from children’s animation on shows like “Sesame Street” in the 1970s to trippy, experimental short films. “He has a really fascinating body of work,” says Numero Group’s Ken Shipley. “When we looked at it, we were like, ‘How can we piece this together the same way we piece a record together?’” Shipley says that the difficulty of putting together a film like this is comparable to the difficulties they face when putting together one of their comp records. “The life of a project tends to be about somebody being passionate about that discovery and driving it to the next place,” he says. “We have so many projects on our white board, there’s probably not enough time to complete them all in the lifetime of the label. A project is driven forward because someone becomes passionate about it.” Asked why exactly Numero Group decided to venture into film, Shipley shrugs, “For us it’s just, ‘Let’s make some cool shit.’” “Celestial Navigations” plays at the Siskel Film Center February 19-20. More info and footage from the film can be found here. (Tom Lynch)

The rumpled red carpet at the State Street entrance of the Siskel Film Center has a bright yellow sign right beside it early Friday evening: FALLING ICE.

In the lobby upstairs, James Allen Smith is nervous. The lobby stirs and buzzes. Smith’s feature documentary, “Floored,” is about to have its first Chicago showing. Three shows on two screens that follow an open-bar reception are sold out. Most filmmakers are nervous before a debut, but this is also a crowd comprised largely of its subjects, floor traders from the CME. They’re potentially its most fervent, eager audience as well. Smith, smiling, realizes he’s clutching an extra copy of the film in its gray plastic box. Greetings are cheery, masculine and plentiful.

“Whoo! Woo! How ya’ doin’, buddy!”

There are women in mostly separate scrums—here’s a fur, a Chanel clutch, “Yes, I remember, we met on the street in Glencoe”—but it’s the men who swan and peacock. There’s some Brooks Brothers with intermittent bowties. A young trader who’s featured loiters in a designer plaid porkpie atop a thick, distressed leather coat. A man juggles two iPhones and a silver card case like a cigarette case. Trader Joseph Gibbons, a producer of the film, wears a bold purple tie below large horn rims and shaved head, twirling a black cigar almost a foot long, the most expensive Tootsie Roll in the Loop. Read the rest of this entry »

Chicago has the good fortune of regular archival programming at Siskel, Facets and the Music Box, but another venue’s slipping a sleek program into the mix starting this weekend. As part of Italics, the Museum of Contemporary Art’s survey of Italian art of the past forty years (running until February 14), eight films will be shown in glorious 35mm, including Visconti’s “The Damned,” Pasolini’s “Decameron,” Antonioni’s “The Passenger,” and little-known Bertolucci and Rosi. Gwen Infusino, Curatorial Administrative Assistant at the MCA, worked on the series. “In curatorial discussions, I had a tendency to compare everything to films, so it was exciting when this project came up.” She began with a list of 100 or so films; except for wild-card “Inglorious Bastards” (pictured) the 1978 inspiration for Tarantino’s latest, they came from that list. Read the rest of this entry »

Rod Blagojevich knows a lot about Elvis.  “If only I knew that much about government, huh?”  The former Illinois governor, indicted last January for conspiring to sell Barack Obama’s vacated Senate seat and other transgressions, showcases his zeal for all things Elvis while defending the 1964 musical, “Viva Las Vegas.”

On a night just before Christmas, Blagojevich speaks at Columbia College’s Cinema Slapdown. Begun in 2006, the Slapdown consists of a free screening followed by intense debate between a faculty member and guest. The atmosphere at Columbia’s Film Row Cinema is often electrifying; audience members boo and cheer the debaters, who ricochet barbs off one another as they argue the merits of films like “Barbarella” and “Showgirls.”

“Viva Las Vegas,” Blagojevich’s pick, is no exception.

Blagojevich goes toe to toe with Film & Video Professor Dan Rybicky, a man who softens no blows. “It’s hard for me to watch young, beautiful Elvis on screen without conjuring up later images of old, fat, drugged-out Elvis, popping pills and eating fried-peanut-butter-and-banana sandwiches before dying an early, fat death… ‘Viva Las Vegas’ isn’t meant to be truthful or resonant, but that might be the difference between you and me, Rod. You might be looking for an escape when you watch a movie… and who can blame you for that, right?” Read the rest of this entry »

Top 5 U.S. Films
“The Hurt Locker,” Kathryn Bigelow
“The Limits of Control,” Jim Jarmusch
“A Serious Man,” Joel and Ethan Coen
“Two Lovers,” James Gray
“The Fantastic Mr. Fox,” Wes Anderson
—Ray Pride

Top 5 Foreign Films
“Summer Hours,” Olivier Assayas
“The Headless Woman,” Lucrecia Martel
“35 Shots of Rum,” Claire Denis
“You, the Living,” Roy Andersson
“Night and Day,” Hong Sang-soo
—Ray Pride Read the rest of this entry »

On December 6, Empty Bottle will screen “Wesley Willis’ Joy Rides,” a documentary about the late local musician and artist. “It was a lot of following him around during his everyday routine,” says Kim Shively, co-director of the documentary. The film is compiled of footage shot over the five years before Willis’ death in 2003. “The first time we filmed was in 1999 I think, and we went up until his death,” Shively says. “We actually weren’t even sure if we were going to finish when he died. We didn’t know if it would be appropriate, but it turned out to be a good tribute.” Willis himself wrote a song about the Empty Bottle, and he often referred to the venue in his lyrics. Shively describes her first impressions of Willis: “It was intimidating at first, being around him, but after you got past the initial uneasiness, you saw he was a great person. He had a bizarre sense of humor, and a unique perspective on the world, and pop culture in particular.”

Esteemed film critic and historian Jonathan Rosenbaum will give a talk at the Newberry Library on December 2 at 5:30pm about his upcoming collection of reviews and articles, “Goodbye Cinema, Hello Cinephilia: Film Culture in Transition,” set to be published in fall of 2010. A book signing will follow. Rosenbaum will be discussing the changing nature of film in regards to the Internet and digital media. “When I do these talks there’s an element of improvisation,” says Rosenbaum. “There’s a kind of division between the older generation of people who believe it’s the end of film, and the young generation of people who think this change is for the better, and it makes movies more accessible.” Rosenbaum finds himself on the side of this new generation of film enthusiasts. “I tend to think that the future of cinema will happen in places other than theaters. It’s no longer operated by the industry; it happens in storefronts and homes.”

Women In Film, a nonprofit organization dedicated to the advancement of women in the film industry, holds its annual fundraiser, The Focus Awards, October 20 at the Chicago Mart Plaza. This year’s evening gala will be decked out with a cocktail reception, a silent auction, dinner and a raffle, and nominees include Donna LaPietra, Emmy Award-winning producer, Janice Arthur, pioneering Steadicam operator and cinematographer, and Nora Dunn, comedienne, actress and director. “The whole event is about celebrating women who express themselves and make daring choices in the film industry,” says Melissa Thornley, president of the organization. “These are women who have followed their heart and done it in a successful way. That’s inspiring for a lot of women.”

Film festivals are retrenching around the world as economies contract and sponsorships dwindle. The Chicago Underground Film Festival’s 2008 edition ran in late October, just as the financial crisis began, at a venue that was difficult to get to by public transportation, during an Indian summer heat wave, opening on the closing night of Chicago International, which also was the night of Barack Obama’s primetime infomercial, just a week before the election. The results were disappointing. But a move to September this year, at the Loop-located Siskel Film Center promises better things. Festival director Bryan Wendorf is optimistic. “The economy didn’t really impact the number of films submitted. The quality, as always, ran the gamut from awful to brilliant but there was plenty to look at and choose from.”

Trends emerge during programming. “I never look to program around a predetermined theme, but once the films and videos are chosen patterns emerge,” Wendorf says. “This year there seems to be a lot of work dealing with ideas about place, home and globalization. Some of the work, like Lucy Raven’s experimental documentary ‘China Town’ deals with this in a very conscious and direct way while other works address these issues from more oblique angles.” Another trend is for work on digital video to exploit its own textures rather than pretending it’s the same as film. “Video is almost infinitely malleable. But the festival has never set out to be a ‘new media’ showcase and we are still seeing great work on 16mm and 35mm.”

Read the rest of this entry »

There is high art, and then there is low art, and then there is terrible art.  The new film, titled “Everything Is Terrible! The Movie,” is a hilarious and strange collection of found footage, compiled by the blogging group Everything Is Terrible.  “All of our footage is ripped from VHS tapes we rescue from thrift stores and video store going-out-of-business sales,” says Katie Rife, a member of Everything Is Terrible.  The footage shown in the film was hand-picked from the amassment of footage the group has gathered throughout the years, which range from comically dated infomercials to creepy children’s shows.  “We gathered together all of the footage onto hard drives, organized it loosely by theme, and just started going through each clip one by one and trimming the fat,” says Rife.   “The ones with the best punch lines made it to the movie.”  The result is a fifty-minute journey through the bizarre underbelly of American media.  The people who will most likely enjoy the movie are “people who cope with the absurdity of life by laughing at it,” says Rife.

The film plays at The Hungry Brain on August 10 at 8:30pm.